Robert Frost in Florida

Author Helen Muir drew on her journalistic and personal correspondence to provide a memoir of her friendship with poet Robert Frost during the 30 years he wintered in South Miami (between 1934-1963). Frost and his wife, Elinor, bought a property in Miami to escape public life. After Elinor’s death, Frost maintained their five-acre home named Pencil Pines, comforting himself with birdwatching and stargazing, cultivating flowers and friendships. We see him through Muir’s eyes as a complex man who was at once petulant and entertaining, self-pitying and curious, a genius at public relations and a guilt-ridden father.

Muir’s children have taken up the task of releasing the work in paperback with a new foreword and new photos to give readers a fresh look at this iconic memoir written by their mother.

Helen Muir wrote about South Florida for over six decades, beginning in 1934, when she came to Miami Beach from the New York Journal to direct publicity at the Roney Plaza. Since then, she has written columns for both The Miami Herald and the now-defunct Miami News, served as children’s book editor of the Herald and drama critic and women’s editor of the News, wrote a syndicated column from Miami, and had written for national magazines such as The Saturday Evening Post, Nation’s Business, and Woman’s Day.

Toby and Mary Muir, Helen’s children, are revising the book for a new edition.